Burnwinter wrote:

Anzac wrote:

I think he's given some indication of his tactical ability with the results v LFC and MC.  Granted they were from the set up as underdog and taking a battering in the 2nd halves of both but it showed an awareness and ability to adapt, as has the change to the 343.

Basically we got the tactics fairly right and had good luck and good resolve in both matches. We'll need the same against Chelsea in the cup final.

The worry is that both of those sides seasons we're finished at that point liverpool were solid first and City solid second. They had a they gap and came back stale while we played both of those games like a cup final.

Burnwinter wrote:

DK Gooner wrote:

Bergkamp joined under Bruce Rioch in June 1995 and Wenger didn't join us until after following season had already started in 1996. No way was Bergkamp a Wenger instruction.

That was my recollection. Either way Wenger may well have recommended the signing, but since he wasn't officially involved at the time I doubt he was intimately involved in getting it done. My point is that Arteta can probably identify players he wants, but who is going to land them?

Well thats apparently Rauls speciality after he got Neymar and co. He gained a reputation for getting deals over the line. (I'm sure working for barca helped that).

Also worth considering Emery has stated that he wanted zaha and was overuled and given pepe. I'm not sure I want Raul a marketing and sales guy making those kinds of decisions. He has Edu and Freddie around him who arent world class scouts either so its a bit of a weird one. Sven and Raul were ment to balance each other out, one the contacts bribe agents type, the other a true footballing scouting mastermind. Which to be fair to the egg head was quite well thought out.

Except Mslintat is really not some sort if special genius, and we still have a scouting network and a data company. Edu will take up that role in consultation with the manager and the dof. Makes sense.

Still bothers me that Edu was second or even third choice. We wanted Monchi.

Not too concerned with losing Sven when we have Cagigao still scouting for us. He needs to be given more power over transfers though.

Burnwinter wrote:

Anzac wrote:

I think he's given some indication of his tactical ability with the results v LFC and MC.  Granted they were from the set up as underdog and taking a battering in the 2nd halves of both but it showed an awareness and ability to adapt, as has the change to the 343.

Basically we got the tactics fairly right and had good luck and good resolve in both matches. We'll need the same against Chelsea in the cup final.

I'm not so convinced that these are templates for the way to play. Essentially this is how the inferior team plays against a better side but more often then not you lose those games.The Liverpool game also camehcame when tbasically have us the result and difficult to read into it with the fast the season was done.

City was better but we played at the higher end of our capability and city were pretty poor finishing wide. Again that's not often going to be the case. 

The other point to me is city and Liverpool are much more dominant and I don't think Chelsea will have the same approach if you look at is you know we really struggled when we have to break teams down so throw that into the mix and it's more difficult.

So basically not sure those games shows some tactical depth because they are so reliant on luck.

Coombs wrote:

Except Mslintat is really not some sort if special genius, and we still have a scouting network and a data company. Edu will take up that role in consultation with the manager and the dof. Makes sense.

. A completely unknown quality campaired to someone who'd made there previous club hundreds of million in the transfer window. The difference is really obvious its liek signing someone who has the potential to score goals rather than the leagues top scorer. 

Except Dortmund continue to do exactly the same thing without Mslintant anywhere near them. The comparison doesn't work, these efforts are more complicated than kicking a ball into a net.

Coombs wrote:

Except Dortmund continue to do exactly the same thing without Mslintant anywhere near them. The comparison doesn't work, these efforts are more complicated than kicking a ball into a net.

Theyre still selling the players bhe brought in. And although he obviously didn't work alone. He was at the head of what we can agree is an incredibly successful scouting department. If that's not a sign of quality I don't know what is. 

Dortmund have been doing this forever. They have a strong culture and systems that are optimized around sourcing upcoming talent and fleecing rich boys once it’s fully developed. They’ve found a perfect niche for developing it because they are in a privileged position where they can beat up on Bundesliga also-rans and offer Champions League to Europe’s best young players. All these things fit nicely together - good scouting, good negotiating team, weak division etc.

I think pretty much every club has access to the same data. It then a comes down to having the right model, attractiveness and of course the right people to make the right decisions. You have to believe Arteta, Edu and Cagigao have it handled between them. I remember Wenger snapping that we knew about every player in Europe when someone praised Sven for Mavropanos, too much is probably made of the mythical powers of guys like Sven and Monchi.

Yeah. The data itself is meaningless. As you say it's the right people. Probably the most important factors would be

• ability to draw the right insights from the data - does your model add value
• having the right decision-making processes around the data - once everyone around the room has all the necessary information

guys like Monchi or Sven might not have mythical powers, but they might have strength in making sure the above 2 things happen.

Yeah totally, I just mean they’ve not got some secret that nobody else has access to, they’re not discovering players that no one else has heard of, they’re just making the right calls and I can’t believe it’s that hard to find someone to do that.

Yeah. What's probably a bigger issue is going to be how Sanllehi, Edu and Venkatseham act once they have all the information in front of them.

Well, hopefully they don't sign more Torreiras, Sokratises, etc.

I think Torreira had the right profile, but it doesn't always work out. Was a beast for us for a short while in his first season, but it doesn't seem like he's quite taken to England.

speedy wrote:

Burnwinter wrote:

How good is Arteta? In truth, I think managers are defined by the history that happens around them. This was certainly true for Wenger in his early days, who inherited half of a top squad that had just had Dennis Bergkamp added to it through David Dein's efforts. Where is Arteta's David Dein?

Slightly harsh on wenger, he inherited an aging alcoholic back line(who were brilliant
but that's a bit of a ticking time bomb) and Bergkamp had flopped badly at inter. And Dean admitted at one point(although I cant recall where I read this) that wenger had instructed that purchase. So the credit of us buying DB10 goes to wenger.

Reports were that AW instructed the club to buy PV4 ahead of him joining as some proof of the club being serious re the support he would get.

Burnwinter wrote:

Anzac wrote:

I think he's given some indication of his tactical ability with the results v LFC and MC.  Granted they were from the set up as underdog and taking a battering in the 2nd halves of both but it showed an awareness and ability to adapt, as has the change to the 343.

Basically we got the tactics fairly right and had good luck and good resolve in both matches. We'll need the same against Chelsea in the cup final.

Agreed, although the games v CFC during the season were much closer/tighter and we should have shared the points overall.
I also think Arteta was very astute as to how he denied both LFC and MC their preferred method/means of playing out from the back.

Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert wrote:

Still bothers me that Edu was second or even third choice. We wanted Monchi.

Monchi wanted the security of returning to Sevilla after his struggles at Roma.